President Donald Trump used his prime time address on Thursday to claim that China interfered in the 2020 elections and that U.S. intelligence agencies covered it up.
Axios detailed that the remarks stand in contrast with assessments from the U.S. intelligence community, which concluded that Beijing had not tried to influence the outcome of the elections.
However, Trump said that "over a period of years, starting during the 2020 election cycle, Beijing carried out what is believed to be the largest compromise of election data in history, resulting in China's illicit acquisition of 220 million U.S. voter files." The outlet noted that there were fewer registered voters in the 2020 election.
Trump went on to say that "raw intelligence obtained by the FBI in 2020, yet buried by rogue bureaucrats, stated that China's activities even included an attempt to manufacture illegal ballots for Joe Biden."
"Documents show that during this period, dozens of significant CIA and NSA reports about China's election targeting were kept out of the presidential briefing. These were briefings I would get almost every day," Trump added.
Elsewhere, the report noted that while U.S. officials warned of Chinese operations seeking to conduct influence campaigns, they all fell short of a concrete effort to play a role in the outcome of the 2020 election.
CBS News cited a White House official who acknowledged that none of the information would reveal that votes were switched or voting machines hacked.
In March 2021, the National Intelligence Council declassified and released a 15-page report that documented actions of foreign governments in related to 2020 election. That report stated that some foreign governments conducted influence campaigns, but unlike what Russia did in 2016, those activities did not involve attacks on the "technical" aspects of the election such as voter registration or vote casting.
The report stated that, like in 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin preferred Trump to win and authorized a range of Russian government organizations to "denigrate" President Biden's candidacy and the Democratic Party. Iran was singled out as preferring Biden and attempting to "undercut" Trump's reelection prospects.
According to the report, other foreign actors—including Lebanese Hezbollah, Cuba, and Venezuela—took some steps to attempt to influence the 2020 election.
In October 2021, two men were indicted related to Iran's "multi-faceted campaign aimed at influencing and interfering with the United States 2020 Presidential Election."
